The core of community and the future of community DAO
This is my blog post, translated at www.DeepL.com/Translator
This article is a continuation of the previous article.
I will describe the core of the community.
Why doesn’t it work?
I’m sure you’ve had a lot of trouble managing your community.
I also struggled with this when I launched the Repro user community.
- Even if you plan an event, you can’t get people to attend.
- Even if the event attracts people, it does not grow into a community and ends up being a one-off event.
- Even if you can get people to attend an event, it doesn’t grow into a community and ends up being a one-off.
- Facebook group is not active at all.
- No posts are generated in the community.
- No response to new feature releases or case study posts.
- The moment you stop an event, the community dies.
No matter what I do, it doesn’t work.
I felt like I was precarious day-to-day management. I had to keep pedaling a bicycle or I would die. To be honest, I had such a sense of dread.
Why can’t the community work well?
At the time, I was unaware of the structure of a community and the core that supports that structure.
The core of the community, I thought, was “sustained centripetal force”.
I believe that this is the secret that determines 70–80% of a community’s success.
What determines the life span of a community
The first time I noticed this was when I did a benchmarking survey when I was preparing for the renewal of the user community.
Strangely enough, there are short-lived communities and long-lived communities in this world.
For example, a high school baseball team aiming for Koshien is a short-lived community. ( Koshien is the national high school baseball championship in Japan. )
It is an enthusiastic community with high goals, but the moment the team is eliminated from Koshien, the team is disbanded for that season.
Buddhism, on the other hand, is a long-lived community that thrives for over 2000 years. It transcends the lifespan of mankind and is astounding.
What is the difference?
Then, back in 2018, I came across a NewsPicks article that cut to the chase on this issue. ( NewsPicks is a business media in Japan. )
Ishikawa: If we look at “self-running organizations” from a different perspective, there are organizations that have been running for 1000 years.
For example, there is the Ise Grand Shrine, which has been rebuilt every 20 years and has continued for 1000 years.
And in the academic world, the community of mathematicians has also lasted for 1000 years. Ise Grand Shrine and the mathematician community have the same structure. In both cases, what is “at the center” is hidden. That’s why the community has continued for a thousand years, with people in the vicinity discussing what the truth is. So it’s better to keep important things hidden.
Sadoshima: For example, since Fermat’s Last Theorem has been solved, the community of mathematicians who were thinking about Fermat’s Last Theorem has dissolved. However, there are still unsolved problems in mathematics, and the community to solve them remains.
Ishikawa: Yes. That is why it is difficult for a community to run on its own if it has said something important.
Minowa: Once the goal tape is cut, the community is already dissolved, isn’t it? If a community sets a goal like a company organization, it will be the end when the goal is achieved.
Sado Island, Ishikawa, and Minowa: The Commonality of “Organizations that Last for 1000 Years
You can’t just cut the goal tape. We have to keep attracting people.
The Buddhist community is indeed a journey towards the unattainable state of “Satori”.
It is a philosophy to free oneself from suffering, and it is a system of learning that has been built up over thousands of years by great geniuses such as Kukai and Saicho.
The more you learn about Buddhism, the more you realize that it has a magical power that will keep attracting people forever.
To create a truly strong and lasting community, we need to continue to attract people, or in other words, we need to have a sustained centripetal force.
Why do we need to sustain centripetal force?
The core of a community is “sustained centripetal force”.
Without this, it becomes difficult to establish a community.
The importance of sustained centripetal force can be seen by understanding the structure of a community.
As I explained in my previous article, “Community structure, strategies, KPIs, and networks” the ideal community structure was like an after-school game of tag in elementary school.
Initially, children gather around the common interest of playing tag.
Through repeated games of tag, the children gradually learn the names of their partners, develop bonds, and build a network of human relationships.
And once they are connected by a strong human network, they will gather even without playing tag.
It’s no longer a group that gathers because of tag, but a group that gathers naturally because they are friends. That’s how it will change.
It is only when human networks are connected in this way that a community can be formed.
In the world of complex networks (network theory), small groups with similarities such as tag groups are called “clusters,” and the strength of the relationships within the cluster is called “network density.
Imagine this.
What if “tag” was a very boring game that you would get bored with after one try?
Children would get bored after playing tag even once, so they would only hang out with the tag team members for the moment.
They won’t remember each other’s names and won’t form bonds of friendship. No human relationship network is built.
In other words, the reason why the tag-playing community was established as a community is that the theme of the tag itself has a “centripetal force” that lasts.
You can play tag a hundred times and never get tired of it.
You can play tag with your friends over and over again, face to face.
This is why tag becomes a community.
When centripetal force is sustained, a network of relationships is formed.
And if the centripetal force is not sustained, it will not become a community.
When the time to attract people is short, there are fewer opportunities for people to see each other again and again, so the human network is not built.
As a result, no matter how long it takes, it will not become a community.
For example, it is difficult to create a community using a festival that only happens once in a lifetime.
If the centripetal force is not sustained, the relationship network will not grow.
Persistence of centripetal force.
I believe that this is the core of creating a human network and making it a community. That’s what I think.
Why do people gather?
The persistence of centripetal force.
To understand this, it is useful to think about “Why do people gather?”.
It was the 17th century. In France, social gatherings were held in the residences of the court and nobility.
This was the birth of the salon.
Nobles, cultural figures, scholars, and writers gathered there, interacted, and enjoyed intellectual conversations.
So why did people gather in salons?
What was it about the “sustained centripetal force” that made the salon a community?
One reason I can think of is that it stimulated the instinct of “intellectual excitement”.
“Intellectual excitement” was the core of the salon.
To put it another way, for the salon to survive, it is necessary to continue providing “intellectual excitement.
For this reason, people from various fields such as scholars and artists were invited to the salon from outside to keep stimulating the intellectual excitement.
This is the KSF (Key Success Factor) of the salon, isn’t it?
I think that if you look into why people gather in this way, you will find that it comes down to human instinct.
What kind of instincts can we provide value to and maintain the centripetal force? I believe that this is the lifeline and the core of what makes a community work as a community.
Mr. Morioka, the man behind the V-shaped recovery of Universal Studio Japan, has also talked about the importance of focusing on instincts, and this is where I got my inspiration.
The lifespan of the community determined by the concept setting
“Sustained Centripetal Force.”
What this warns us about is the importance of the community concept and the importance of setting a theme.
The scary thing is that the life span of a community is largely determined by the community concept that is set.
How much of a difference can a concept or theme make?
Let’s check the data on retention rates for online salons.
The following is the retention rate data of two Online Salons.
(Online Salons is a popular paid subscription community in Japan)
This is the comparison data of a certain fashion online salon and a certain business skill online salon. The price range for both is the same, about 1,000 yen per month.
A certain business skill salon has no needs once you learn some skills. They have a short life span thematically.
On the other hand, fashion salons have permanent needs because there are trends every year. You can intuitively see that it has a long thematic life.
If you look at the retention rate data for both, you can see that there is a big difference. The retention rate is higher for the fashion online salon, which has a permanent theme.
The difference in retention rate is so large that if a certain number of members join every month, the difference in the number of member users will be six times larger in five years.
In addition to these two, a comparative study of various communities will allow you to notice the differences in themes and categories.
To improve the retention rate, many cases lead to the consideration of community measures.
However, it is possible that reviewing the theme setting rather than considering the measures may be more relevant to the root of the retention rate.
The core of “centripetal sustainability” gives us such a perspective.
The first step is to analyze the position of your product
So how do you set a theme?
The first step in creating a theme is to understand the position of your product.
Let’s evaluate your product on the axis of “product depth”. Does your product have the depth or not?
It should be in either the Minecraft type or the nail clipper type.
Minecraft-type products have a great deal of freedom and depth of product use. You can forget about time and immerse yourself in the product, and conversations among fans naturally become more lively. The product itself has a lasting power of attraction.
But what about a product called a nail clipper? It’s a one-issue product that does just that: cut nails. There is only one use case for it, and the product has no depth. No one will talk about nail clippers, and no interaction will take place. The product itself has little staying power and is short-lived.
As you can see, the degree of difficulty in creating a community depends on the position of your product.
It is effective to start by understanding whether your product is in a geopolitically advantageous or disadvantageous position.
Strategy for the Weak: Conceptualizing Beyond the Product
Many B2B products find themselves in a geopolitically disadvantageous position.
Can you the maintain centripetal force for one or two years just by telling people how to use your product? Will users be interested in it?
Probably not.
That’s why you need to create a concept that goes beyond the product and focuses on the success of your customers.
This was the reason why I failed.
I didn’t pay attention to the sustainability of the community concept and started with a “product utilization” community that was very much from my company’s perspective. There is a limit to how much you can cover in terms of operations in that state.
Strategy of the Strong: Empowerment & Depth
A Minecraft-type product has a high level of staying power, so it is easy to take steps to empower the already existing power, like LEGO IDEAS. ( Komaya-san’s blog is a good reference)
Another approach is to “create depth in the product.
In addition to the main battle royale game, FORTNITE also has a variety of elements that are not directly related to the game design, such as party royale. Musicians’ concerts are famous, and recently a werewolf game has been implemented.
The more packable the product becomes, the more this kind of depth will naturally activate interaction among users. This makes it possible to continue attracting people over the long term.
MMO RPGs are the most advanced in this area. It can be called metaverse.
Notes on concept setting: who, what, and purpose
The strategy of the weak and the strategy of the strong in the position of the product is just an auxiliary line of thinking. They are like rulers.
In the end, it is important to focus on the essence of who (Who) and what (What) when reducing it to a concept.
My mistake was that I tried to create a “community to make people use the product” from the perspective of the company. This is something I need to reflect on.
In this regard, Nagahashi-san has written a wonderful blog. It is a wonderful blog that I would like to read again and again.
Also, the form of a community changes depending on its purpose. You don’t necessarily need to build a network of relationships. Depending on the purpose of your company, you may want to have as little as 1% of your audience interacting with you, like on YouTube.
I think it is important to work backward from the objective to achieve the best design.
Persistence of centripetal force depends on the price
The persistence of centripetal force is also greatly affected by price.
The following is the retention rate of a business-related online salon.
One is about 1,000 yen per month. The other is about 10,000 yen per month.
The slope of the retention rate is more skewed for the more expensive community. The reason for this is that the high price of 10,000 yen causes you to constantly consult with your wallet each month. This increases the probability of churn.
What can be said from this is that persistence changes depending on complex factors such as price, which are the 4Ps of marketing.
Designing the core cycle of customer experience with high frequency
Peloton is known for having an enthusiastic user community.
Why does Peloton have such a highly engaged community?
What is the secret of what makes the Peloton community a community?
I believe the secret is in the “structure” of the customer experience.
Peloton users ride their Peloton bikes every day or several times a week.
They have the opportunity to come face to face with other users on a daily or weekly basis. With that much frequency, it’s easy to build a network of relationships.
It may be similar to the design of a college experience. The reason we can make friends in college is because of the “weekly lectures”. By having the opportunity to see each other on a regular basis every week, we are able to build a network of friendships.
In this way, Peloton is structurally designed to foster community, and community is built into the cycle of habitual use of Peloton.
A community or product has a cycle of customer experience that is used repeatedly. The structure of this customer experience cycle determines the “centripetal sustainability” of the product.
If the core cycle of light users only rotates at a low frequency, be careful. For example, do you have a situation where the majority of your light users only look at Slack once every two to three months?
The probability that a user who accesses Slack only once every two or three months will access the community again is low. Even if you plan and manage an event and get users to participate in it, they will quickly become inactive.
The core cycle of the customer experience is just a low-frequency structure, and the community will not thrive.
(This can be technically confirmed by looking at the probability distribution properties of the Poisson distribution.)
To put it simply, “Is the community embedded in the company’s product usage cycle?” This is a hint for reform.
If the community can be redesigned in such a way that it rotates at a high frequency, it will have a more sustained centripetal force and become a more active community like Peloton.
You can read more about redesigning the core cycle in another blog.
(If you have a need, let me know and I’ll translate it into English!)
The future of Community: NFT and DAO
I would like to conclude this note with an introduction to the future of community management.
In the next few years, communization will accelerate rapidly, and at an exponential rate.
This is because of the emergence of Web 3.0.
What is Web 3.0? To put it simply, it is a revolution equivalent to the birth of the Internet in the 1990s. At the same time, it is an innovation equivalent to the reinvention of corporations, banking, and finance 400 years ago, and the birth of a new democracy.
Until now, the stock was issued to raise funds, and an organization called a joint-stock company was formed and operated to maximize shareholder profits.
However, in the post-Web 3.0 society, everyone will be able to issue their own currency, NFT. They will issue their own NFTs, raise funds, and exercise their decision-making power based on the rules of the algorithm and according to the percentage of NFTs they own, rather than following the opinions of shareholders.
This type of organization is called a DAO (Decentralised Autonomous Organisation).
This is the new type of organization that will replace the stock company.
This innovation will make “working for a corporation” a thing of the past and shift the trend to “working for a DAO”. It is almost a definite future.
An important point from the community perspective is that “NFTs can be given to customers.
Users, as customers, get NFTs for services they want to support, and can actively spread the word and contribute to community management. Depending on their contribution and the percentage of NFTs they own, they can receive higher-level services or earn money.
Users will not only “Pay to Use” but will also “Contribute to Earn”.
In other words, the clear line between “management and customers” will disappear, and a future will arrive in which companies and users will blend into one another with vague gradations.
This is the future of the sustained centripetal force.
Future Community Case Study
I wrote “future”, but this story is already a reality.
I would like to introduce “chiliz” as an example that is easy to imagine.
“chiliz” is a next-generation fan community that connects fans of sports clubs around the world with players and teams on the Internet. For example, Barça fans can belong to the “Barça Nation” by holding $BAR, the currency of Barça.
And, depending on their contribution to the community, they will be able to get special experiences from players/clubs.
You will also be able to participate in decisions that determine the future of the club through voting rights, similar to voting rights in stocks. Enthusiastic fans will be able to get involved in the running of the club, and fans will be able to initiate word-of-mouth promotions. Barça will also be able to increase its revenue stream by launching NFTs of limited edition digital goods exclusively for Barça. Fans will be able to purchase these goods. Of course, the non-copyable NFTs will be used so that the digital goods can be resold and traded within the community.
This is a spontaneous economic activity within the community.
In a sense, it is the birth of a small nation.
In a sense, this is the birth of a small nation, and it is already a reality that we cannot even begin to comprehend.
I also recommend the following article on the future of the community through DAO.
The DAO is so revolutionary that it makes the world look 180 degrees different. It’s not just about the user community, but because we realize that it will change the way democracy works, which has been going on for hundreds of years.
I can’t write about DAO and crypto-driven communities due to word count, so please check them out.
The future of rapid communization is just around the corner.
Thank you for reading the above.
I hope you found some of this information useful!
